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Wheezer
Wheezer was a sworn brother of the Black Company in Shadow Games and the first two Books of Glittering Stone. ''Shadow Games'' Wheezer and a companion nicknamed Baldo were summoned by the monks of the Temple of Travellers' Repose to act as a guides for the Company during their journey south in Shadow Games. He and Baldo were short, elderly, "wizened" natives of D'loc Aloc and would get their nicknames from Goblin. Wheezer was named for his chronic cough, a result of consumption and a life-long habit of chewing qat, a narcotic root. Baldo turned back at the boundary of D'loc Aloc, but Wheezer chose to stay with them and was admitted as a Company brother. Croaker wrote candidly that he was "thrilled" Wheezer had joined, and called him "a second-rate soul son of One-Eye, full of ridiculous mischief". He helped them find guides in the savannah of the K'Hlata. After this, and despite Croaker's initial enthusiasm, Wheezer was largely seen as useless due to his poor health and advanced age. Wheezer was present with One-Eye, Geek, and Freak at the bazaar in Gea-Xle where One-Eye purchased the imp Frogface. ''Bleak Seasons'' Wheezer survived the Battle of Dejagore and made it back inside Dejagore's walls after the Black Company and the Taglian armies under their command were routed. Murgen the Annalist recorded that Wheezer – despite his infirmity – had "busted heads with the best of them". He even survived the horrible Siege of Dejagore, where he sided with Murgen's Old Crew faction against the Nar. During the siege, his namesake cough became much worse. At one point during the siege, Wheezer relayed messages between Murgen and Mogaba. He passed along a private communication from Mogaba's second-in-command, Sindawe, which revealed that Sindawe was having personal doubts about Mogaba's leadership. ''She Is the Darkness'' Wheezer made it through the rest of the Shadowmaster wars. Then, seven years after he joined the Company, at the end of She Is the Darkness, Wheezer accompanied Croaker, Lady, Murgen, and about 46 others during their first expedition onto the shadow-infested glittering plain. With a fireball projector, he unintentionally shot some holes through the invisible protective barrier that shielded the expedition from the shadows. Lady plugged the holes as best as possible, but ordered Wheezer to sit closest to that spot, so that if shadows breached, his screams would warn the others. Wheezer endured a long night staring and shaking in restless fear, but fortunately no shadows emerged. After they entered the fortress with no name, he and approximately 34 others from that group became the Captured: trapped in stasis by Soulcatcher inside the cave of the ancients. Unlike most of them, however, Wheezer would never wake up. At some point during the 15-year-gap between She Is the Darkness and Water Sleeps, he and 6 other Captured (Candles, Longinus, two Shadar soldiers, and two Nyueng Bao bodyguards) were unintentionally killed when their magic stasis was interrupted by Cordy Mather. His body was discovered by Sleepy and her Company companions toward the end of Water Sleeps. Category:Characters Category:Characters from D'loc Aloc Category:Black Company Category:The Captured